California

I just finished buying tickets on-line for the Met season. Whew! The site has been so sluggish that it took me over an hour to buy roughly two weeks worth of tickets, given the time-out feature. The site is also very user unfriendly. After you pick a seat and add it to your cart, it's ridiculously complicated getting back to shopping to pick another. My sense is that a lot more tickets have sold and many fewer good seats were available, compared to other years, although I haven't attempted anything like a serious count of availability.

There is an aesthetics blog, Aesthetics for Birds: https://aestheticsforbirds.com/ The American Society for Aesthetics maintains a Facebook group which mainly features announcements from members about events concerning all the arts: https://www.facebook.com/groups/7399905817/

I complain a lot about the Lincoln Center Festival, so I should report that an e-mail announcing the season with information on pre-sale just arrived Wednesday afternoon. Better late than never!

Typical of Lincoln Center Festival: I am a member of Friends of Lincoln Center and re-sign up each year to be on the Festival e-mailing list. But the first I'm hearing about this year's festival is a NY times article and the web page. No email to Friends... http://www.lincolncenter.org/lc-festival/

Some consolation, but still far from what other companies offer. Pennsylvania, San Francisco, and Colorado all let subscribers and friends pick their own seats from seating charts before the general public, using a code they are sent to log in or by logging into your friends account first. I, for one, like to see what's available in several sections I prefer and pick my favorite option for each, for about a dozen programs during the two-week season.

But you can't pick out your own seat, unless they just changed that from previous years.

The company just posted this obituary on their web site: http://www.trishabrowncompany.org/index.php

Friends of Covent Garden just sent out e-mail that they will announce the 2017-18 season on April 5. I'm hoping for good scheduling for the new Twyla Tharp to Haydn, shown on a Steve McCrae Instagram: https://twitter.com/_stevenmcrae/status/835212979071221761/photo/1

This was just sent out by e-mail: The School of American Ballet is very pleased to announce the 2017 Workshop Performances, taking place on Saturday, June 3rd at 2:00pm and 8:00pm and Monday, June 5 at 7:00pm. . . . This year's program . . . will feature: Scènes de Ballet Music by Igor Stravinsky Choreography by Christopher Wheeldon Hallelujah Junction Music by John Adams Choreography by Peter Martins Scotch Symphony Music by Felix Mendelssohn Choreography by George Balanchine Performance tickets will go on sale to the public at www.sab.org in mid-April.

I don't fault ABT for using the English translation in hopes that more people would be likely to consider buying tickets. It's not so unusual to change names for that purpose. Some of us are still trying to understand why J.K. Rowlings' first book was sold in the UK as "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" but renamed for US sales to ". . . Sorcerer's Stone." Did they think "philosopher" would be too high-brow and intimidating?

A few more thoughts, triggered by comments from others: Duster spent a lot of time with Cuban company and noted their emphasis on perfect unison in the corps - something she wants to work on. Corella said he would like to do their own sets and costumes someday. These were rented from elsewhere. It was strange that so few took final bows - leads plus 6 corps men. No women from jardin. And the two little boys who joined jardin (same boys at every performance ) deserved their own bows. Sz: those were definitely Corella's own Ali pants, as per the Preludes program Saturday.

I'm in Philadelphia for the first weekend (5 performances) of their new Le Corsaire. For those of you on the east coast, this is definitely worth the trip for the remaining four next weekend. My favorite Medora was Mayara Pineiro, one of the dancers Angel Corella brought in. She was also my favorite in the new Don Quixote last year. So much sparkle, fabulous technique, really exciting to see. She was just as terrific as Gulnare opening night on Thursday. For this ballet, she was partnered by Aleksey Babayev, still a corps member, who turned out to be my favorite of the male dancers. He also did a sizzling Ali Sunday afternoon. Other stand-outs: Jermel Johnson, a long-time company member, who did Lankendem opening night and nothing else (although most seemed to be doing two or even three roles). Arian Molina Soca as Conrad opening night, Lankendem on Friday, and Ali Saturday matinee. Sterling Baca as Ali on opening night, Conrad on Friday, and Lankendem on Saturday night. Mixed performances: Peter Weil on Friday night as Ali had a visible problem lifting Medora overhead near the beginning of the pas de trois in Act II. He seemed to hesitate half way up, then did a deep knee bend and hoisted her the rest of the way. As if to make amends, he was on fire in his variations that followed and was an audience favorite. On Saturday night, Albert Gordon as Ali didn't even try that lift - Aaron Anker as Conrad did it both at the beginning and end of the pas de trois, clearly planned ahead of time. A really nice audience outreach feature: one hour before every performance, they have something called "preludes" open to all ticket holders with a different guest speaker at each and hosted by the marketing manager. Saturday matinee was a special treat, with Corella himself answering questions. He explained that when the rented costumes arrived, he didn't like the costume for Ali so he brought in his personal Ali costume that he had used during his dancing career! All the dancers in that role are wearing it. So if they look familiar, that's why. He also said he wanted the three Odalisques in the third act, so there was more dancing in that act (other than the Jardin Animee). We learned that although Ali is routinely called a "slave," that word has disappeared from the program; Ali is now a "servant." The marketing department took responsibility for that change. At the session with Samantha Dunster (assistant artistic director), we learned that many of the non-dancing extras are parents of students at the Academy, as Corella thought they needed different ages in the crowd. Pasha at all performances is Jon Martin, a teacher at the Academy. The production moves very briskly, with a minimum of mime: 2 hours and 10 minutes, including two intermissions. The sets and costumes were rented, reportedly created originally for the now-defunct International Ballet in Indianapolis. The impressive sets drew audience applause when the curtain went up. The costumes were fine, except for a peculiar tutu on the Odalisques, Gulnare in Act I, and Jardin. The skirt would have reached down to the knee except for a stiff hoop about half way down on the underside. That resulted in some unfortunate developments in partnering when the skirt flipped up toward Gulnare's face. They looked like lampshades with odd fringes to me. Casting for all performances is in the printed program for the run. If I could only go to one more performance, it would be next Saturday evening with Pineiro and Babayev as Medora and Conrad, and Soca as Ali. Sterling Baca fans can see him next Friday as Ali, Saturday matinee as Conrad, and Sunday matinee as Lankendem.

The $60 basic membership at Kennedy Center is a good deal -- priority ticket buying and lots of reminders when those come up on the schedule: http://www.kennedy-center.org/membership/index

I've been a member of the Friends of Lincoln Center for several years (at the lowest level - $100 - mainly to get some slight priority in buying tickets). They are really awful at sending out information to Friends about upcoming summer Festival events. I usually find out about them some other way (this site, e.g.!) We have been told about Jewels (repeatedly!), but nothing else.

Tickets for $39 are for sale on Goldstar-Philadelphia - but only for the final Sunday performance. Perhaps they are optimistic about last-minute rush or have given a lot of tickets to student groups. It occurs to me that serious balletomanes know Corsaire has lots of juicy roles for principals and soloists and is fun to see. But it's not as well-known as, say, Swan Lake or Nutcracker for newbies. So next season goes overboard on work that newcomers are likely to consider attending.

Most modern companies don't perform in large opera houses. Even NYCB needs to bring in the money with Nutcracker to support the rest of the season. And Philadelphia is so close to New York, that serious ballet lovers looking for new work have easy access there. Others here noted a lot of unsold seats for Corsaire, which opens this Thursday, and you have to think there's pressure all around to bring in more audiences next year with sure-things.

It looks to me like he needed (1) blockbusters to bring in paying customers (Sleeping Beauty, Nutcracker, Swan Lake) and (2) Balanchine, to keep that legacy alive. Not much in the way of experimental, high-risk, contemporary work, but not many cities support that.

The 2017-2018 season has just been announced. Here's the web page: http://www.paballet.org/upcoming-programs THE SLEEPING BEAUTY by Angel Corella (after Petipa) Music by Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky October 12-22, 2017 Academy of Music The classic fairytale brought to life ON EDGE World Premiere by Helen Pickett World Premiere by Matthew Neenan Episode 31 by Alexander Ekman November 9-12, 2017 Merriam Theater New and exciting cutting-edge dance GEORGE BALANCHINE'S THE NUTCRACKER by George Balanchine Music by Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky December 8-31, 2017 Academy of Music Philadelphia's greatest holiday tradition SWAN LAKE by Angel Corella (after Petipa) Music by Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky March 8-18, 2018 Academy of Music The most enduring classical ballet of all time GRACE & GRANDEUR Paquita by Marius Petipa For Four by Christopher Wheeldon Theme and Variations by George Balanchine Music by Minkus, Schubert, and Tchaikovsky April 5-8, 2018 Merriam Theater The power and beauty of ballet JEWELS Emeralds, Rubies, and Diamonds by George Balanchine Music by Fauré, Stravinsky, and Tchaikovsky May 10-13, 2018 Academy of Music Balanchine's sparkling masterpiec

Their Swan Lake is March 31-April 12, so maybe she'll return for that: https://www.sfballet.org/season/repertory/program-06

Their web site has a page for "rush tickets": http://www.paballet.org/rush-tickets $10 for students & $15 for others, one hour before

The dramatic cuts in NEA's overall appropriation explain much of the decreases. They just don't have the money. And for political reasons, they can't just send it all to NYC, but need to recognize good programs around the country.

The funding history for NEA is here: https://www.arts.gov/open-government/national-endowment-arts-appropriations-history Note that the largest appropriation in the 50-year history of NEA was $175,954,680 in 1992. None of these numbers is inflation-adjusted! (NEH typically gets the identical amount to NEA.) Understanding these budgets can be confusing. Each consists of four elements: (1) direct grants (which includes about 1/3 going to state arts councils), (2) NEA administration, (3) gifts-and-matching funds to match private funds with government funds, (4) challenge grants for buildings and endowments. Regardless of the size of the budget, NEA performs an invaluable service, as does NEH, with its elaborate review process. Only the top ten foundations are big enough to run comparable reviews. So a grant from NEA is a "Good Housekeeping seal" that helps grantees raise additional funding from private sources unable to conduct an extensive review. Even a small grant is a huge benefit that way.

If you follow Kent on Instagram, you saw that she invited Marcelo Gomes to visit the company during rehearsals for some coaching when he was in town for the ABT performances at the Kennedy Center. Kent herself (in soft shoes) demonstrated some things. And, of course, Victor Barbee is also there for coaching. So I'm pleased to see that the results were visible at this rehearsal. As I often say, there is an enormous amount of raw talent in classical dancers in the smaller regional companies and limited opportunities for dancers to perform professionally in this country. When company directors make good programming choices and bring in coaching help, very satisfying performances can result.

Ballet West's season for 2017-18 was just announced. https://balletwest.org/2017-2018-season Aladdin October 19 – October 22 Carmina Burana November 3 – November 11 The Nutcracker 2017 December 2 – December 30 Cinderella February 9 – February 25 With Ashton's choreography! The Shakespeare Suite April 13 – April 21 This includes Kylian (Return to a Strange Land) and Cunningham (Summerspace). National Choreographic Festival May 18 – May 26

The Pennsylvania Ballet just mailed out a postcard that it will be announcing the 2017-18 season "in a few short weeks." But it goes on to say: Does anyone remember if he ever performed this with ABT or other companies?